The invention relates to a device for controlling pharmaceutical products, in particular, hard gelatin capsules, by means of a radiation source preferably designed as an X-ray source, comprising a storage device which receives the products in an uncontrolled manner, and from which the products are transferred to a transport element in which the products are arranged such that they form at least one row, wherein the products are transported in a clocked manner in the radiation area (25) of the radiation source (11) which exposes the products to radiation, preferably perpendicular to the longitudinal direction thereof, wherein a first stopping device for separating the products in the row is arranged upstream of the radiation source in the direction of transportation of the products and wherein at least one sensor element coupled to an evaluation device captures the radiation which passed through the products.
Such a device is known from the subsequently published German patent application DE 10 2010 038 544 A1 of the applicant. The net weight of filling material located in hard gelatin capsules can, e.g., be determined using the known device with the aid of a radiation source designed as an X-ray source. In addition, the device is suited, e.g., to detecting undesirable foreign particles or the like in the hard gelatin capsules. In one variant to the embodiment disclosed in FIG. 6 of the addressed document, the pharmaceutical products arrive at a shaft-shaped transport device, in which the pharmaceutical products (hard gelatin capsules) are arranged in a row one above the other, from a storage element that accommodates the pharmaceutical products in an uncontrolled manner. In order to be able to separate respectively one pharmaceutical product from the row, a stopping device in the form of a ratchet pawl is provided, with which the respectively lowest hard gelatin capsule of the row can be separated. Only this hard gelatin capsule is evaluated with regard to the properties mentioned above (net weight or foreign particles) by the image of the X-rays on the side of the hard gelatin capsule opposite to the X-ray source being captured by means of an image recording sensor and being supplied to an evaluation device. A disadvantage with the known device is the relatively low output thereof.